Body painting and first

[Alex Burman]

lifes short party naked

[hoorayforpink]

at the ucf regional in florida a few of our students did that and they had to put their shirts on, the staff said they didnt want it smeered on the stands and seats and whatnot

but to say it doesnt convey the spirit of First i believe isnt rite

[Paul H]

Originally Posted by Bill_Hancoc

Team 33 did this @ GLR during the finals. Only they just had their number on their chest. Until that point they wore shirts- as far as i can remember. But they were standing on the edge of the field-where spectators stand. and they got a great response from the crowd and some of the refs were really into it as well and came over and started cheering but i noticed that they never were shot on the big screen and after one match of doing this one of the staff came over and told them they needed to put shirts on it was un-FIRST-like or something to that effect.

I can also see where no shirts in the pits could be dangerous but i support body painting as long as it isnt taken too far as said above.

We started doing that in 2003, and as far as I know they've done it ever since. Here's a pic of the "founding fathers" of the Killer Bees body painting (actually in those days we used permanent markers and it would last on us for a few days!)

Cool fact...I was the "I" back in the day, and this year at Great Lakes they recruited my 9 year old brother to be the "I"....my other brother that is on the team now couldn't do it because he was the human player.

As you may imagine, I don't have any problem with body painting at all!

[Tetraman]

I think it's more of the person's personal beliefs too. I'm sure any FIRST-respsecting volunteer would allow it, but someone with their personality-factor going into it might make a difference.

We were going to paint our chests, but we didn't have enough paint. So we went with faces.

[raiofsunshine]

Like Jason Kixmiller said, FIRST is a new program, that isn't widely known about. Therefore, the image of a bunch of loud teenagers, prancing about without shirts on. Personally, I don't think that one needs body paint to show your spirt. There are so many other ways one can accomlish that goal, there is no reason to be getting up in arms about the whole bodypaint thing.

[65_Xero_Huskie]

I think this is just an issue at the venue
At GLR this year there was this really strict security gueard
she kept coming over to us when we were hitting baloons around in the stands and taking them and poping them. i mean come on...balls were flying around ont he field, so whats the point?
and last year at Midwest regional we wernt aloud to get up and dance or do anything or else security would come over and tell us to sit down and stuff.
personally i think you should be able to show spirit as long as its not hurting anyone, people had their shirts off at GTR but i dont know if anyone said anything to them.

[GlitterRave113]

Ya, some of us had that problem at the philly regionals as well. every time we would stand up and cheer for our robot, people would complain. i understand that we were blocking them, but it was for like ten seconds! I think that everyone should be able to express their spirit, especially when their robot is up, but hey, that's only my opinion... I think that they should make a huge assigned section for people that want to dance, that way we wouldn't block anybody and we could cheer for our teams properly! Maybe they could even make this assigned section a place for people who want to show off their paint!

[Dillon Compton]

Originally Posted by GlitterRave113

Ya, some of us had that problem at the philly regionals as well. every time we would stand up and cheer for our robot, people would complain. i understand that we were blocking them, but it was for like ten seconds!

Really? We were loud, had a couple hundred ballons (At one point), big blue streamers on 10ft pieces of PVC, and the only thing we were asked to do was to keep the ballons off the field/in the stands!

-Dillon Compton
Team 1394

[Swan217]

Originally Posted by Meli W.

Back when FIRST was still at Disney, this was really common. In fact, in the FIRST booklet given out at regionals in 2003 there was a picture of this with people with body paint on them at the 2002 Championships. Things change though.

217 did that a lot. When we became the Thunderchickens though, the teachers stopped us because it wasn't "sophisticated" enough. Not like it's really put a damper on 217's spirits, of course...

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/24383

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/24380

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/24381

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/24382

[Katie Reynolds]

For the Milwaukee Regional, Team 857 bought facepaint. I told the students that they could paint their faces but to limit it to that - no full body painting. When they asked why I told them:

1. It's not appropriate to run around the venue without your shirt on; mostly because it's potentially damaging to our team image. What if one of our sponsors saw you and thought, "I'm paying $8,000/year for these kids to run around half-naked?? No way!"
2. You won't be allowed in the pits and we might need you there.
3. It's cold outside! You'll need to put your jacket on anyway to eat lunch (and your mom will kill you - and maybe me - if you come home with blue paint all over everything)

If another team wants to paint their bodies - go for it! As for my team, I'd rather have them running around with blue faces and our team shirt on (which has our logo, number, sponsors, etc) than with a big "8" on their chests.

[nobrakes8]

I saw you guys at hartford during the timeout in the semi-finals.. There was nothing wrong with what you guys did.. Plus Dean Kamen's goal is to make students excited about FIRST and have the events run like a sporting event.. I don't think I've see any college basketball or football game on TV without seeing fans with body paint..

The fact that somebody told you that you can't go into the pits without a shirt means that a pit admin or supervisor saw you guys and didn't see anything wrong with it, as long as you weren't in the pits where you could get cut up on some machines... I'm under the impression a voulenteer (probably an adult one) saw you guys and they probably felt you were out-of-line.. But, I'm sure guys did the right thing and shut up and just put on your shirts. If this happened before lunch you could have asked to talk a supervisor or somebody on the planning committee and I'm sure they would have told you that you were OK to have the body paint.

[FourPenguins]

Originally Posted by Meli W.

Back when FIRST was still at Disney, this was really common. In fact, in the FIRST booklet given out at regionals in 2003 there was a picture of this with people with body paint on them at the 2002 Championships. Things change though.

Whether times change or not, FIRST at one time endorsed (if only by implication) this kind of team spirit, and there has never been a rule against it. I think that unless your lack of attire is legally indecent or you're in the pit (there's a legitimate safety concern) FIRST volunteers are out of line to discourage or disallow it.
However, if they do tell you to cover up, they're in charge, so you have to listen.

[GeorgeTheEng]

Originally Posted by GlitterRave113

Ya, some of us had that problem at the philly regionals as well. every time we would stand up and cheer for our robot, people would complain. i understand that we were blocking them, but it was for like ten seconds! I think that everyone should be able to express their spirit, especially when their robot is up, but hey, that's only my opinion... I think that they should make a huge assigned section for people that want to dance, that way we wouldn't block anybody and we could cheer for our teams properly! Maybe they could even make this assigned section a place for people who want to show off their paint!

That's surprising... It definitely not the judges that prompted that... And I doubt the regional director, refs, or field volunteers would mind... They'd be all for that type of spirit. In fact, the judges are looking for that kind of spirit for the team spirit award.

One thing that should be remembered throughout this discussion, the vast majority of people at the events are volunteers. I'm not saying that excuses them, but before being too harsh, everyone should remember that these people are giving up there time to help out. Personally, I see no problems with it myself as long as the half-naked painted spirited individuals are still decently attired... My team did this a number of years ago at VCU, Philly, and Epcot with no problems...

[KenWittlief]

Keep in mind at EPCOT we were in a glorified parking lot.

They will not let you into any of the theme parks now without a shirt. I suspect its because, if they do, then sooner or later some organization will get behind some woman who files a lawsuit for 'equal access'.

If guys can run around wearing nothing but shorts and body paint then.... ?

(Whenever something doesnt make sense at face values, there are lawyers involved :^)

[Mr. Freeman]

This year our team had some face paint on. I don't recall any teams having body paint though.

However, last year the pink team came to the Colorado regional (I have never seen more pink in my entire life) and I think that some of the pink team members were wearing body paint.